The Seven Loves of John Bates
by StuckInThePast
Summary: Seven days, seven drabbles, seven loves.  A brief glimpse at seven aspects of love, seen through the eyes of John Bates.
1. Platonic Love

**The Seven Loves of John Bates**

I don't own Downton Abbey, John Bates (how unfortunate D:) or any other recognisable characters that may appear in this fanfiction. John's siblings, who appear in this drabble, are mine.

I'll also take this opportunity to plug the Highclere Awards (downtonabbeyfanawards(dot)forumup(dot)co(dot)uk). We're running voting for outstanding fanfiction at the moment, and we'll have various activities going on throughout the year. We hope to see you there!

**Platonic/Family Love**

As a child, there is one person in the world that John loves above anyone else. The only person he can tell anything to, the only person that will tell him anything. They have wonderful fun together, and there's nobody he'd rather spend his time with. He may be a twelve-year-old boy, but this person, he knows with all his soul, is the person he loves most. More than his sisters, more than his parents, more than anybody - John loves his little brother.


	2. First Love

First Love

John's certain he's in love with Marie. He is thirteen and she is eleven, and there's nothing better than spending time with her. His brother normally tags along, but John's beginning to get fed up of him. When Marie's not there, George is fine, but sometimes he just wants to be alone with her.

That doesn't matter, though. It's alright to love her more, because one day he's going to make her his wife, and you're supposed to love your wife more than anybody, aren't you?

Then her father gets a new job and she moves away, he writes her but she doesn't care to write back, and it ought to bother him but it doesn't. Maybe it wasn't love after all.


	3. OneSided Love

Well, the seven days thing is obviously failing, because I'm queen of lazy and all that. Still - here is chapter 3. :)

**3. One-Sided Love**

When John meets Alice at the age of fifteen, he's convinced. He's grown up since Marie, he knows he has, and Alice is pretty and clever and sweet and gentle, and John knows he loves her. He sends her flowers from his father's shop, shares his lunch with her, buys her little presents and hides them in her schoolbag, for the pleasure of seeing her surprise when she finds them. After all, isn't that what love is?

He's told nobody, but he really is in love with Alice.

And his heart really is broken, when he sees Alice kissing George on the cheek as they walk together towards the path through the woodlands – the path known to the whole school as the meeting point for lovers.


	4. Four More Loves

**__**_I was going through my documents and found this. I never posted it, so, well, here you go. :)_

**Romantic Love**

John meets Vera while he is still recovering from losing Alice to his supposedly dear brother, and he quickly learns to care for her. He loves her, even. He does, and she loves him, too. They start courting young, and by the time they are eighteen he has proposed to her, and she has accepted. She even forgives him for throwing away the opportunity to become a well-respected, sensible florist in favour of joining the army, and by that he knows how lucky he is to have her. His father isn't as satisfied with it, and disinherits John in favour of George. Another reason, John discovers, for him to grow distant from his brother, and his new sister-in-law Alice. And another reason to grow closer to his beloved fiancee.

**Lustful Love**

It's getting harder to put up with Vera all the time, and John finds himself spending more time at the local pub and less time at home with her. She won't always have him when he wants it, and he's beginning to look elsewhere. He needs to satisfy his needs, she doesn't understand how stressful his work is, and if he has a few too many drinks in the evening and finds someone who will relieve him, who does it hurt? Vera knows and she doesn't care. John suspects that it's because she's doing something similar, but it makes sense – if they don't make each other happy, why shouldn't they find people who will?

John downs the rest of his beer and grins at the girl perched precariously on top of the bar in front of him. He can't recall her name, but what does that matter? He can see experience in her eyes and tonight is just going to be about having a good time, with a professional.

**Doomed Love**

He's been in hospital, having his leg seen to. It's been much more painful recently, and he can't understand why. The doctors don't think there's much they can do, but they're going to operate and so he has to stay for three days. He doesn't know where Vera is, his family have disappeared, he has nobody.

And that's when he meets Susanne, after being wheeled into the hospital canteen to find some company for lunch. She takes a fascinated interest in him, asking about his leg and the war, admiring his bravery and sacrifice. She smiles and catches his eye when she speaks, and there's a beautiful glint in it that tells him he could fall in love with her. It's down to her, in the end, that he makes the vow never to drink again.

The day he leaves the hospital, so does she. But he goes to live with his mother. She goes to live in the earth, and he mourns her as if he'd known her for years.

**True Love**

It isn't perfect. He has married Anna and is so, wonderfully happy with her. They have two beautiful daughters, very young, and so ready to break out and into the world. John is a protective father, and a protective husband. He loves his girls more than he's ever loved before. Nothing compares to this and he can't imagine anything being a better, fuller love. It isn't perfect, but it's so, so true. He and Anna do everything together, their daughters oblivious to the troubles that have got them there. He's told Anna everything about his past now, about his loves, and she has forgiven him everything, because she knows he'd always choose her above any of them.

But he's never told Anna about Susanne.


End file.
